anti-depressants being conducted 'in secret'

"Although there has not been a jump in adverse events from SSRIs, there has been community concern about potential overuse," said the TGA

Medicare stats show that, since 1990, when Prozac first was on pharmacy shelves, there have been almost 10,000 reports of suspected adverse reactions to SSRIs.

Over 12 million SSRI antidepressant scripts were subsidized by the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme last year.

psychiatrist Yolande Lucire, has reported between 300 and 400 cases to the TGA which she claims patients have had serious reactions to the anti-depressants, a few who had committed suicide. This inquiry must be made public.

"This is being done in secret. We have no terms of reference, no opportunity for people to make submissions; it's a scandal." Says Dr.Lucire

Federal Health Department secretary Jane Halton wrote to Dr Lucire telling her that her inquiry was under way and the panel would report back to her at the end of this year.

"This only happened after," Dr Lucire said. "In frustration at being fobbed off by the TGA, I personally sent the head of the department 100 cases detailing what had actually happened to people who went from being fully functioning members of the community to patients with serious mental health problems and some who in fact killed themselves after being put on these drugs for stress-related disorders."

The TGA asked all drug companies that market SSRI anti-depressants in Australia to update the wording of their suicide warnings concerning children and young people under 24 years.

investigation revealed several hundred thousand prescriptions for anti-depressants like Zoloft and Prozac were last year prescribed to children and subsidized through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, despite the TGA and Pfizer, the company that markets Zoloft in Australia, recommending they not be prescribed to anyone under the age of 24.

Significant discrepancies in the information given to parents about the potential dangers of the drugs to children were also uncovered.

Two weeks ago, Melbourne mother reached a confidential court settlement with her 16-year-old daughter's GP, who she had sued for prescribing Zoloft to her daughter for depression.

Mulcahey claimed the drug made her daughter suicidal and said she was not advised of the risks.

In another case a 14-year-old girl became suicidal after taking Zoloft. Her parents said they were not warned this might happen nor told to monitor her for symptoms of suicidal thoughts or self-harm.

"But in the general setting I would say that nothing new in the literature suggests we need to be any more vigilant than we already have been when it comes to documenting the side effects of this class of drug," Dr Kitching said.

I think that all your topics are good ones, and I agree with you that some of them would be harder to research than others. Especially when it comes down to the whole youtube controversy. Many people do use and abuse that online network but it would be very hard to keep getting information because you would actually have to look for the bad stuff on youtube, and I don't know if I could take that mentally. It would be really tough, plus you would also have to fight the school system to get information. SSRIs sound like the best bet kid. GOOD LUCK!

Emily's Review

I really liked all three of your topics! But your last topic, SSRI's was very interesting. I think that you will be able to find alot of ongoing information to keep you busy for the length of time we have to research. You could interview people in the medical field to see what their opinions are about SSRI's. I'm sure that you will be able to find alot of information online, in books, magazines, and in the newspapers. I think that your last topic will keep you interested for a while, and I can't wait to hear more about what you have researched.

It sounds like you already have the topic you really want to do. It sounds like a really interesting topic and you're going to have a lot of currency because docotors are always changing and reasearching and trying new things. I would look into medical magazines I think you can find some online, a lot of those have intersting articles that really pick apart pros and cons of the situation. Also looking for interviews with people that have expierenced the medical procedures your writing about would really help your paper be relateable. I think your idea about really working with the brain and how the medicane effects a human sounds like a hit. You could write 50 pages on the brain and our minds and how it all fits together.
Good Luck!

My First Research

This year I'm very excited about doing my I Search paper because I'm going to be able to study my topic more in-depth then I was able to last year with the amount of time I'm given. The things I was most interested in studying were SSRI's and there affect on the brain, YouTube's pros and cons, and Nature. Vs. Nurture is it in our DNA or do we learn to behave that way?

I was very interested in SSRI's after reading an article in a magazine about teens and antidepressants. In the article it talked about how SSRI's work and the pros and cons of using that as a method to solve depression. While I was researching SSRI's I found it very easy to use all of the search engines/tools. It seemed to be a current topic that is constantly being updated. Doctors and pharmacists are constantly looking for alternative ways to treat depression. I found Google News and Marvel to be very helpful. Google News was most helpful though. Google news is updated by the minute so any time a new article is posted it comes up in your search results which I like because they were all very current unlike some that came while searching Marvel.

My second choice was YouTube and its pros and cons as well as how it affects today's youth. I decide this was something I was interested in because with all the talk on the news about girls fighting girls in middle school bathrooms and then posting it on YouTube for others to watch left me dumbfounded and wanting to know more about how YouTube is used and abused. It was really hard to find articles on Google news about this because the school has it blocked which meant I had to change my search a little bit to social networking. Once I did that I got a lot of hits, but nothing that sparked my interest. The databases were more helpful on this topic because they didn't block articles that mentioned things about YouTube. After researching about YouTube, although it will always be changing with the constant video uploads I don't think its something that could keep me interested for 6 months.

My third choice was Nature. Vs. Nurture, out of all three topics of interest this was the hardest to find current information. Google nor the Databases really had anything I wanted to read, it was mostly books about this topic or how this topic is intertwined in many other areas.

Over all I was most intrigued by SSRI’s and the affect on the brain, it struck me as something I could keep myself interested in for the next 6 months.